Activists Call On Wharton School To Cancel Jim Perdue's Speech
United Poultry Concerns Will Hold Protest If Perdue Is Not Cancelled

Machipongo, VA-United Poultry Concerns has sent letters urging The
Wharton School Family-Controlled Corporation Program (FCCP) to cancel
its speaking invitation to Jim Perdue of Perdue Farms at its May 23
dinner in the Ballroom at the Benjamin Franklin House, 9th & Chestnut
Streets in Philadelphia 5:30-9:30 pm. The dinner honors finalists for
the 2001 Family Business of the Year Awards. If Jim Perdue speaks,
activist will protest from 4:30 - 6:00 pm outside the Ballroom.

Human rights advocates, religious groups, animal advocates,
legislators, OSHA, and environmentalists have cited Perdue Farms for
its morally indifferent business attitude and behavior for decades.
Jim Perdue has been a leading opponent of efforts to regulate poultry
farms on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, Delaware, and Virginia,
blocking laws to protect the Chesapeake Bay from further Pfiesteria
piscicida outbreaks following 1997's outbreak linked to uncontrolled
poultry waste. In 2000 a federal judge ruled that Perdue Farms
willfully and negligently violated federal wage laws by denying its
workers overtime wages. This year the court ordered Perdue Farms to
pay $2.4 million back pay to these workers.

Perdue Farms has fought against having to assume any ethical
responsibility towards the communities of the Eastern Shore, the
states in which the company operates, its workers, its millions of
birds, and the ecosystem as a whole. "In honoring family firms, The
Wharton School should include corporate stewardship and business
ethics along with profit-making criteria," says Karen Davis,
president of United Poultry Concerns. "Perdue Farms is a cruel
company whose corrosive practices are restrained only by government
intervention and citizens' groups. We call upon the University of
Pennsylvania and The Wharton School to withdraw Jim Perdue's speaking
invitation. If Wharton doesn't cancel Perdue, United Poultry Concerns
will hold a protest demonstration at the Benjamin Franklin House, May
23, 4:30 - 6 pm."

United Poultry Concerns is a national nonprofit public information
animal advocacy organization addressing the treatment of domestic
fowl in food production, science, education, entertainment, and human
companionship situations.